Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

Pollution Control

Anna McMorrin: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessments his Department made of the potential effects of leaving the EU on the Government’s commitment to tackle air pollution and decarbonisation.

Dr Thérèse Coffey: The Government is fully committed to tackling air pollution and climate change and that is independent of being a member of the EU. We have put in place a £3.5 billion plan to improve air quality. The UK also has ambitious, international targets in place to significantly reduce emissions of five damaging air pollutants by 2020 and 2030 and we are developing a Clean Air Strategy to deliver these goals. We will continue to work with member states of the EU in achieving cleaner air, recognising the transboundary nature of some pollutants. The European Union (Withdrawal) Bill is designed to ensure that, as far as possible, the same rules and laws will apply on the day after we leave as on the day before. It will be for Parliament (and in some cases for the devolved legislatures) to make any future changes in legislation after we have left the EU. With regards to decarbonisation, whatever the nature of the future UK-EU relationship, the UK will remain committed to international efforts to tackle climate change. Our domestic legislation - the Climate Change Act – requires us to make ambitious reductions, more than those required of us by the EU.

Attorney General

Attorney General: ICT

Jon Trickett: To ask the Attorney General, what steps his offices are taking to implement the guidance set out by the Government Commercial Function in its paper entitled Exiting Major IT Contracts: Guidance for Departments, published in November 2017, in respect of (a) using market engagement, (b) setting up disaggregation work, (c) risk assessment, (d) developing a programme plan through the transition, (e) identifying the skills and capabilities that will be needed in the future and (f) any other work related to that guidance.

Jeremy Wright: The CPS is fully aligned with the Government Commercial Function paper "Exiting Major IT Contracts: Guidance for Departments”.The programme to disaggregate and replace ICT services delivered through a PFI contract with CGI (formally Logica) since 2002 is well advanced and will complete in 2019. Throughout the programme the CPS has worked in partnership with the Government Digital Service and the Crown Commercial Service, securing spending control approval from Cabinet Office and HM Treasury where appropriate. The CPS’s strategy ensures that it is aligned with the government’s Technology Code of Practice including the principle of cloud-first services.In 2015 the CPS carried out a major review of its internal capability across all aspects of ICT including technical, service management, commercial and programme management. As a result a new separate ICT Commercial Team was established and a number of new roles were established and filled in its Digital Technology Services Directorate.The CPS operates detailed programme plans and associated risk logs to manage each phase of the disaggregation including pre-market engagement, procurement, service transition and service exit.The CPS has used pan-government frameworks, let and managed by the Crown Commercial Service to replace network, telephony, print and applications hosting and management services. It is planning to use these frameworks to replace service desk and end user computing services in 2018. As part of each procurement process, it undertakes market engagement, the extent of which is dependent on the size and complexity of the contract to be awarded.The CPS provides ICT services to the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) and HMCPSI.The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) does not have any large outsourced single vendor IT contract in place.It uses a multi-vendor approach, selecting suppliers based on their ability to support their specialised systems, and that is combined with in-house teams, which have grown in size in recent years as they reduce their reliance on external providers.The SFO regularly reviews all its IT contracts taking into account the potential for disaggregation, benefits, costs, timing, risks, and overall value for money, in line with the guidance provided by the Government Commercial Function.The largest contract currently in place is with Capita, and that contract is due to expire in July 2019. Ahead of that, a full review will take place, to determine whether it continues to outsource this service to Capita or another provider, or bring the service in house.The Government Legal Department (GLD) does not hold any large single provider contracts worth over £20 million per year which fall within the guidance published in November 2017. GLD uses its own in-house IT services as well as using a multi provider approach when delivering any IT services. It is committed to following the principles contained within the guidance where applicable.

Northern Ireland Office

Northern Ireland Office: Families

Fiona Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, to which legislation his Department has applied the Family Test, published in August 2014.

Chloe Smith: It is our assessment that no legislation taken forward by the Northern Ireland Office since August 2014 has required the application of the Family Test by the UK Government. The Government is committed to supporting families. To achieve this, in 2014 we introduced the Family Test, which aims to ensure that impacts on family relationships and functioning are recognised early on during the process of policy development and help inform the policy decisions made by Ministers. The Family Test was not designed to be a ‘tick-box’ exercise, and as such there is no requirement for departments to publish the results of assessments made under the Family Test.

Ministry of Defence

Ministry of Defence: ICT

Jon Trickett: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps his Department is taking to implement the guidance set out by the Government Commercial Function in its paper entitled Exiting Major IT Contracts: Guidance for Departments, published in November 2017, in respect of (a) using market engagement, (b) setting up disaggregation work, (c) risk assessment, (d) developing a programme plan through the transition, (e) identifying the skills and capabilities that will be needed in the future and (f) any other work related to that guidance.

Harriett Baldwin: The Ministry of Defence (MOD) Information Systems and Services (ISS) organisation is already implementing the guidance set out by the Government Commercial Function (GCF) in its paper entitled Exiting Major IT Contracts: Guidance for Departments. The ISS strategy seeks to disaggregate requirements into smaller component parts where this is deemed to be value for money, with work on this having started in 2015.A multi-disciplinary team has been stood up to oversee the entire portfolio of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) capabilities. This team is tasked with the management of an overarching Portfolio Plan, for the further disaggregation of the large ICT Outsource contracts in Defence. In line with the guidance in the GCF paper, the Portfolio Plan covers multiple years and takes a methodical risk based approach.There is a renewed emphasis on early market engagement and ISS has a six-weekly programme of interactions with Industry via its relationship with techUK. The MOD has launched a new Supplier Portal on Defence Contracts Online which will make it easier for suppliers to access a wide range of defence opportunities.ISS has a Strategic Workforce Plan that outlines future ISS skills requirements.